How Old Were You When You Were Seven? And Other Questions By MW
by urdearestmom
Summary: In which Michael is a lightweight and El is a fuckin saint.


It was a known fact that Mike Wheeler and large intakes of alcohol did not mix. He was a notorious lightweight and tended to get really weird, or weirder than he usually was, anyway, if he drank too much. This didn't happen very often but there were some occasions, all of which were recalled in great detail by his wife and friends the next day. Every time, he would make the same claim: "I'm never drinking again!"

And yet, every time, he would wake up with a hangover and a disgustingly amused El next to him, just waiting for him to wake up so she could tell him all about his stupidity from the night before.

Therefore, it is of no surprise to him when he wakes up with a massive headache and a groan only to hear a slight and muffled giggle from behind him.

"I don't want to hear it, El. Whatever stupid shit I pulled last night, I do _not_ want to hear about it."

Mike feels her hand slide up his back and grasp his shoulder, gently squeezing. "Come on, it wasn't that bad," she says.

"You always say that and yet it's always a lie."

"No!" She protests. "It was actually kind of cute. Funny as hell, though."

He groans again, pressing the side of his face further into their mattress. "I feel like I'm going to hear about it at some point whether I like it or not," he answers.

"Yeah, Will'll probably tell you. I think he actually cried, it was that funny."

"Dear god…"

* * *

The initial discovery of the especially strange side of Mike that only seemed to be brought out by excessive drunkenness (and which the Party supposed might also be brought out if he ever somehow got high) occurred one night when they were seventeen and had managed to snag a couple of cases of beer. Really it had been Max's doing, but the rest of them agreed to drink and went along with her.

They'd been sitting out in the junkyard around a fire pit, surrounded by rusty vehicles and appliances, seeing who could drink the most beers and stay the most sober. Mike had been leaning against his warm girlfriend, nanoseconds away from sleep, when he jolted up like he'd been poked with a cattle prod.

"Dustin! _Dustin!"_ He crowed, trying desperately to get the attention of his mostly sober friend who was sitting exactly two feet away from him.

"What is it, Mike?" Dustin had asked, sipping from his third can.

"I have a question," Mike had stated, a very serious look painted across his features.

"And…?" Prompted Dustin.

"It's very important."

Lucas let out a frustrated sigh. "Dude, just ask your damn question already."

Mike glared at the other boy. "That's not nice, Lucas. But Dustin, how old were you when you were seven?"

There was silence and crickets were heard chirping as the group stared at Mike, then moved their gazes to Dustin, waiting for an answer. How old _were_ they when they were seven, really?

"What?"

Mike sighed and rolled his eyes as if Dustin was stupid for not understanding his question. "I said, how old were you when you were seven?"

The curly-haired boy shook his head. "No, I understood your question. It just didn't make any sense."

Mike seemed to wilt at this answer, leaning back into El's warmth and sniffling like a little kid who'd been denied ice cream. "That's _mean._ "

And that had been that. The next day they'd all laughed and recalled with perfect clarity how weird Drunk Mike had been, and said boy refused to even consider the idea that there would be a next time.

* * *

Of course, there was a next time, and it just so happened to be the night of prom. The group had gone to the dance at their school, and had promptly fucked off to Will's house as soon as it was over. Joyce and Hopper had planned a trip out of town that weekend so the kids could have the house, knowing that they would probably be up to shenanigans their parents didn't want to know about and figuring that they'd be reasonable enough not to do anything overly stupid.

They'd been at it for an hour and it was past midnight when Will noticed that Mike seemed to be staring at nothing, his gaze fixated on a random spot on the wall just above the TV.

"Hey, Mike, what are you doing?" His words were slurred, but still understandable.

Mike tore his eyes from the wallpaper to stare blankly at his oldest friend, Will feeling like the other boy was looking straight into his soul. "Just… figuring out how to talk to Satan," he answered casually, as if it was the most normal thing in the world. Then he started humming Highway To Hell, getting up and going into the kitchen to fetch a glass of water that no one had asked for.

Upon exiting the kitchen, Mike promptly dropped the cup and started to cry when he saw the water dampening the carpet. He kneeled down and lay himself over it as if by covering it he could pretend it wasn't there, and then sadly said, "Get possessed," and closed his eyes.

Everyone stared until it was apparent that Mike had fallen asleep, Max breaking the silence with a belly-rumbling laugh. "What in the _fuck_ was that?!" She exclaimed.

The three boys joined her while El shook her head and leaned back into the couch, wondering how in the fuck she'd landed herself with such a weirdo.

In the morning, Mike woke up with a horrible headache, a sore body from sleeping on the floor all night, and a wet patch on the front of his dress shirt. His first thought was _fuck, Mom's going to kill me_ followed by _what the hell happened last night?_

His friends recounted the story through tears of laughter and he groaned, realizing he'd done it again and swearing up and down that he would never drink.

* * *

There was another next time, after graduation, that was particularly memorable. Steve had sneaked Dustin some drinks and the group had decided to go hang out by Castle Byers for a while, reminiscing about their childhood and growing up. They had a fun time, deciding to head back to the Byers-Hopper house before it got too dark because both El and Will would probably always be jumpy at night.

Mike went to the bathroom to relieve himself, having acted like a little child who needed to pee really badly in the middle of a long car ride for the last five minutes, and had come back into the living room holding a roll of toilet paper. He had then proceeded to throw it at Lucas (who caught it) before saying, "Who wants to go TP old man Kowalski's lawn with me?"

Max looked up at him, squinting, before answering with a solemn, "Do you think we're ready?"

Mike scoffed at her. "Do I _think_ we're ready? Does this answer your question?" He walked over, took the toilet paper from Lucas, and threw it at Max instead.

She seemed to consider it before shrugging. "Let's do it."

The two had to be convinced not to leave the house, as it was late and they'd only end up getting in trouble (it had been five years, but Mr. Kowalski hadn't forgotten the time Mike cursed him out).

The others hadn't found Mike's general weirdness to be as… _weird_ that time, but it was quite hilarious that he'd somehow convinced Max, the person he had most animosity with, to go deface an old man's property with him simply by throwing a roll of toilet paper at her and spewing nonsense.

He swore once more that never again would he drink enough to become so strange, but by then even he knew it was a lie.

* * *

The next time that anyone remembered anything was when Mike and El had gone to a roommate's birthday in the second semester of college. Even though it was only a nineteenth, there were many drinks to be had.

Accordingly, Mike got drunk off his ass and proceeded to be a total spazz, in his words. El had called their friends the next day to inform them, using up all the long-distance minutes she had. Drunk Mike's shenanigans had become a sort of running joke within the Party, and before they'd all gone off to college El had been made to promise that she would report back whenever Mike did regrettably stupid shit. Things had happened as follows:

Mike had decided that the Coke El had given him to try and sober him up a little was not enough to satiate his thirst and so got up from a game of charades to get himself something else. On his way back he'd been _yodelling_ , something El had never seen him do before, and it had caught the attention of everyone else. When he noticed that everyone's eyes were on him he smirked and raised his cup, proclaiming, "When your water source is dried up and all you have to drink is bleach, am I right?!"

He took a gulp and then fell, spilling whatever the drink was all down his front. Then he lay on the floor giggling until his poor girlfriend decided it would be best to take him back to his room.

"Sorry, guys, he gets really weird when he's too drunk. Always been like this," she'd said, looping one of his arms around her neck and dragging the rest of him up and out of the room

(If she used her powers to help herself a little, no one needed to know.)

El'd gotten him successfully into his bed and was struggling to take his wet shirt off of him when he pushed her face away and started mumbling something about dragons. "Stop breathing fire, I'm trying to sleep here…"

"Michael Wheeler, if you do not let me take this shirt off of you right now, so help me god!"

"M'name's Mike. Are you my mom?"

She rolled her eyes. "No dummy, I'm your girlfriend. You're drunk."

"Drunk is bad…" Suddenly he sat up. "I have a _girlfriend_?!"

"You've had one for the past four and a half years, Mike."

"Oh…" He lay back down. "I bet she's the most beautiful girl in the world." He was staring at the crack in the ceiling with glazed eyes.

Eventually, El managed to get his shirt off and left him sleeping soundly with a glass of water and some aspirin on his desk.

The next day he awoke with a lump on the back of his head, ringing in his ears, and a scratchy throat. He was already preparing for the flood of comments about the previous night and making a vow to himself that this time, he wouldn't do it again.

* * *

He had mostly kept that promise for the next few years, managing to drink but keep himself sober enough that he wouldn't do anything weird. It had lasted until, apparently, last night.

Mike sighs, El's warm hand still sliding around his back as if to comfort him. "Fine. Tell me." He turns over to face her. "It's less embarrassing when it's you."

She grins. "So…"

He can already tell she's about to start laughing. "Come on, I wasn't _that_ drunk last night!"

"We would all beg to differ!"

"I wasn't!"

"You flirted with me the entire night!"

Mike furrows his brows, confused as to why that's funny. "So? You're my wife."

"You asked me if I was single and cried when I said I wasn't," she says, keeping a straight face.

"Oh." He can feel the heat rise in his face, knowing immediately that he's turning bright red.

It's then, observing her husband's mounting embarrassment, that El bursts out laughing. She'd wanted to last night, but she was afraid it would hurt Drunk Mike's feelings even more.

Hungover Mike rips his pillow out from under his head and covers his face with it, trying to block out the sound. "Fuck off," he grunts.

"Or fuck me," she answers cheekily. "Since that's what you wanted so badly last night."

"Goddammit, El."

"Damn it all to hell, Mike. Did you ever figure out how to talk to Satan?" She asks, smirking.

He takes the pillow off and glares. "This is an abomination."

"What is?"

"This," he says, gesturing between them. "This entire situation is an abomination."

"Well, you created it."

"And I want to stop it."

She hums, bringing a hand up and brushing it across his cheek. "Happy New Year, Mike. I love you even when you don't remember we're married."

He'd thought she was going to be cute, but that is not the case. "Ugh, you're such a troll!" He exclaims. She doesn't say anything, and he knows that she's waiting for him to respond. "…but I love you too, even when I don't remember we're married. It's because I always feel like you're too good to be true."

El pulls on a chunk of his hair lightly, making him look fully at her. "What's too good to be true is the silence in this house." She jumps out of bed and slides her feet into her slippers. "Drink some water and get up, you walking hangover. Wait'll I tell Will you're awake."

She leaves the room before he can even say lickety-split. _But why the fuck would I say lickety-split? Who_ ** _says_** _that?_ He decides it must be a lasting effect of all the shit he drank last night.

Mike doesn't even make it two steps into the hall before he hears a lilting, "Oh, Michael…!"

He groans again. "I refuse to even look at you, William."

"No, honestly, I think last night just about tops all of your previous encounters of the alcoholic kind."

He wrinkles his nose. "Was that supposed to be a Spielberg reference?"

Will appears in his limited field of vision (Mike is not turning his head, attempting to lessen his headache). "A terrible reference, but yeah," he says.

Mike eyes his brother-in-law with wariness. "Can I go now?"

Will grins and holds an arm out in the direction of the bathroom. "Of course! Just be sure to remember that you're in your in-laws' house."

In response, Mike lets out an irritated sigh. "Jesus Christ, man, let me live."

It's safe to say that this one's going down in the books, too.


End file.
